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Sex slaves forced to work 20-hour days, court hears

Stephanie Gardiner

A north shore brothel madam brought six women to Australia and forced them to work 20 hours every day, ordering them to perform sex acts they had refused, a court has heard.

Chee Mei Wong, 39, has pleaded not guilty to seven charges, including that she ran a brothel that involved the sexual servitude of the women between 2008 and 2010.

Crown prosecutor Carolyn Davenport, SC, said Ms Wong, who called herself "Yoko", recruited the women from Malaysia and enrolled them in courses so they could get student visas, which allowed them to work a maximum of 20 hours per week.

They were told they had to work off a debt of $5000 for the enrolments, airfares and the visas, Ms Davenport told the District Court of NSW in Sydney on Monday.

"They were given a list of services that must be performed. Some of them immediately said ... they were not prepared to perform them," Ms Davenport told the jury in her opening address.

"They were told that they must and they did not have a choice. They were told that they were not to leave the brothel until they had paid their debt."

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Ms Davenport said that despite having a cap on their working hours, the women would often end up working 20-hour days at the Diamonds brothel in Willoughby, from midday to early in the morning.

"They were not allowed to attend school. Though some were allowed to go very occasionally, the majority were not allowed to go at all," she said.

In 2009 some of the women told a former client about their conditions and he helped them go to the authorities, the court heard.

Ms Wong's barrister, Bruce Quinn, said she was only a receptionist at the brothel.

Mr Quinn said the women had only ever worked their regulated 20 hours a week, and some had left the brothel after less than a month.

"It's the defence case that this is a sham and the complainants wanted to stay in Australia," he said.

"It's a great place to live - why wouldn't you want to stay in Australia? But there was no sexual servitude and there was no working beyond the 20 hours a week."

He said many of the women went on to work at other brothels after quitting Diamonds.